Deadly Premonition: The Director's Cut

It's only fitting that a game featuring references to and dialog about obscure movies from the past few decades would have a press event in Hollywood, California. The birthplace of modern cinema that no doubt had an effect on Swery 65 and his universally divisive Deadly Premonition. He was on hand along with Access Games Producer, Tomio Kawazawa to show off the latest evolution of the mysterious masterpiece, Deadly Premonition: Director's Cut. What has been an Xbox 360 exclusive for nearly three years now will soon be accessible to PS3 owners, featuring newly improved graphics, redesigned controls, and all new content that expands upon the Deadly Premonition world.

The first, and most visible improvement is the newly redrawn textures that greatly improve the graphical fidelity and detail. The short hands-off demo gave us a good look and the improvements are definitely visible, displaying enhancements to the lighting and shaders, along with an improved frame rate. Though I have to admit, the extra large television displaying the game showed that anti-aliasing is still not present, and having it on such a large display didn't do the game many favors. A surprising addition that sadly wasn't available for display, the inclusion of stereoscopic 3D, taking full advantage of the PS3's capabilities. The visual touch-ups also a include a few minor things like allowing players to change York's daily appearance.

The graphics aren't the only thing receiving an overhaul for this Director's Cut. The controls were one of the many points of contention when it came to enjoying Deadly Premonition, and the changes are definitely for the better. Players will immediately notice that these new controls feel a lot closer to other third-person action games and even allows players the option to further customize controls, by mapping button functions to whatever fits their own personal preference. PS Move controls have also been added, though unfortunately were not available at the time of the demonstration. The overworld map has also received a bit of love and care and now does a better job of displaying the player's location and objectives or side missions.

Another major addition for the Director's Cut is the inclusion of a new introduction and additional segments to the ending that were written by Swery. While the Xbox version of Deadly Premonition was a complete game in its own right, the new content further expands upon the story and is an added bonus that will hopefully get Xbox 360 owners to jump on board this new release as well. I got a brief look at the new introduction and saw a few new characters that weren't present in the original game. It will be interesting to see how these characters fit in to the case of the Greenvale Murders, and what relationship they have with FBI Agent Francis York Morgan. All of the side-quests and collectibles from the original title remain and new items and costumes can be purchased online. Trophies have also been included, with fifty different goals to achieve.

Rising Star Games is set to release Deadly Premonition: Director's Cut during the end of April this year, so while we're still a few months away things were looking very promising for Swery and Access Games. The new controls look to make it much easier to get in to the game and the upgraded visuals are definitely appreciated. Hopefully the mind-blowing quirkiness will resonate with PS3 owners the same way it has with Xbox 360 gamers and give them a chance to see why Deadly Premonition enjoys such cult-hit status when it is released this coming April.

* The product in this article was sent to us by the developer/company.

About Author

In a past life I worked with Interplay, EA, Harmonix, Konami, and a number of other developers. Now I'm working for a record label, a small arm of casual games in a media company along with Gaming Nexus, and anywhere else that sees fit to employ me.